He's now with the A's. His projection is really a shot in the dark, considering he's missed 2 of the last 3 seasons completely. Based on the data I have, he will strike out so much, and Oakland being such a terrible place to hit for average anyway, that I have him at .203 going by memory. I suppose his upside is that the older McPherson takes a few more walks, and he hits like Jack Cust has the last few years. Downside is obviously a full year of DL time. He also might just hit 30 bombs for Sacramento.

I have him as a +4 runs per season hitter, with a rate stat line of 276/375/367. His baserunning has been worth 5-7 runs per year from 2005 to 2008. Baseball Prospectus has him at another +4 runs for 2009. The average is about +5.5 per year, given age I'll estimate +4 for 2010. His defense, according to Fangraphs UZR, has been excellent the last 2 years as a 3rd baseman. A projection puts him about a +5 fielder. Replacement level is 20 runs below average per 150 games.

Add it all up, and he's 35 runs per year above replacement per 150 games. Since I have him projected to play 137 (he's had some injuries here and there) that gets knocked down to 3.2 wins. On a 1 year deal and 4.4 million per win, that is worth 14 million.

I don't know what's going to happen to baseball salaries but my guess is that the days of 10% salary hikes every year are over. I'm assuming it increases by 100K per year over the next 5, but plug in your own numbers if you disagree. Assuming a decline of 0.5 wins per year due to age, he's worth 36 million over 3 years or 50 over 5, which from what I read is what he's asking for.

His value is greatest if he plays 3rd base. As a corner outfielder, if I assume he'd be +5 runs on defense, he'd only be worth 25/3 or 32/5 because of the greater offense expected from the position.

For the Angels, I'm torn. I hate to see Figgins go but it's time to give Brandon Wood a shot to play. He projects as an average overall player right now, but being only 25 for 2010, he should be the better player by 2012.

First note: I've made a correction which results in numbers for many of the minor leaguers having slightly lower projections. I've seen a few comments, here and other places, suggesting that I've got some of the minor leaguers too high. Andy Tracy takes a huge hit with the update, but mostly because he's projected as a free agent now instead of in homer haven Philadelphia.

I decided to look at how my projections for AAAA hitters last season turned out. I looked for players who fir these criteria: 1) at least 27 years old. 2)at least -5 runs per 150 and 3)most of the data feeding the projection comes from the minors. The players who fit this group include, based on most playing time in 2009:

Nelson Cruz, Garrett Jones, Ryan Raburn, Micah Hoffpauir, Brian Buscher, Oscar Salazar, Josh Whitesell, Randy Ruiz, Jeff Bailey, Luis Montanez, and Matt Murton. Those are the ones with the most playing time in 2009. Some others on the list, like Victor Diaz, Josh Phelps, Brian Myrow, and Mike Hessman, didn't play at all. The projected OPS of this group, of all AAAA hitters identified is .766. The projected OPS of the ones listed above who got at least 50 PA in 2009 is .778. What was the average OPS for the group? .820. Of course, guys like Nelson Cruz, establishing himself as a good player gets a lot more playing time than a AAAA guy who struggled like Whitesell. So if I take the unweighted average, I get .780.

Looks like the projections were dead on as to the overall ability of this group of players.

I was told Brandon Allen is a member of the Diamonbacks now, not the White Sox. I also found Chris Carter, who's with the Mets instead of the Red Sox. These players will be with their new teams next update. Feel free to post any other team corrections here.

Here are some guys who stick out to me as having surprisingly good projections. One is Brian Myrow, who has been one of the better minor league hitters around for close to a decade. He'll be 33 but has only about 50 big league at bats to his name. Every year in the minors he hits for a good average, an OBP well above .400, and 10-15 homerun power. He actually projects as the best hitter on the Pirate's roster. At least I think he's there, he finished the season with Indianapolis, but might be a minor league free agent.

Myrow's projection is 275/376/435, maybe he'd get a chance if Garrett Jones, another AAAA player who got a shot last year, has trouble in his second go-around. Or maybe he'll wind up like Roberto Petagine, a great "what if?" story.

Shelley Duncan projects to a solid 257/340/512. He actually got a chance to play a little bit in 2007, and hit very well in a Kevin Maas/Shane Spencer kind of way. Back in the minors almost all of last year, he hit another 30 homers. His projection of 16 runs above average is comparable to the DH options on the free agent market. It might make sense for the Yankees to give Duncan the job on the cheap, that way if Posada or A-Rod have injuries and need to DH you aren't wasting an expensive bat on the bench. Instead of spending 10-12 million for a left fielder and a DH, just go to the top of the market and get Holliday as your left fielder. Duncan is already 30, so he's not a long term option, but probably has as much to offer from here to the end of his career as Hideki Matsui has from age 36 to the end of his career.